Is my sister BU or her HR department?

[PiperChapstick]

My DSis returned to work affer maternity leave 6 months ago. Before she had her DD she worked 5 days a week. She wanted to go part-time (3 days a week) when she returned, but rather than officially requesting this, she told her boss she wanted to return on full-times hours, but use the annual leave she's accumulated + annual leave for the coming year (60 days in total) to take 2 days off a week (Monday & Friday) for 30 weeks. Basically so she could work part-time but get full-time pay for a while. Her manager agreed to the plan (he is a v close friend of hers though, he's godparent to her DD).

When she'd been back 5 months she put in a formal request with HR to go 3 days part-time, once her holidays had been used up. They've come back to her and denied her request. The reason being that the nature of her job means that it's extremely difficult to recruit someone who would fill in the remaining 2 days, especially a Monday and a Friday. They told her because she was happy to return full-time after maternity leave that they assumed she meant permanently, and had she just asked to be part-time before she returned they'd have looked upon it far more favourably and factored those hours into the business planning (HR weren't aware of the fact she was only actually in the office 3 days a week).

She is putting in a formal complaint about the HR team for discrimination (of what though I don't know!).

Maybe I'm having a bad day but I just don't have much sympathy and don't think HR are BU - I feel she took the gamble and didnt care much for what her arrangement meant for the business. Then again, they've seemingly managed with her being in only 3 days a week til now, and her manager agreed to the arrangement, so maybe SINBU?

I'm an employment lawyer (I'm saying this only so that the OP knows I am stating the law). It is impossible to say whether there is an issue here. The OP's DSis seems to have been told second hand (by her manager) what HR have said and so we don't know for sure that they said they'd have looked upon the request more favourably if she'd put it in sooner.

Apart from that one comment, who can tell whether there's an issue or not. It entirely depends on whether the working arrangement has run smoothly for the past few months or whether others have been having to cover her (on the basis that it's "holiday"). She isn't entitled to work part time at the moment. Having said that, if it truly is the case that none of her work has needed to be done on Mondays or Fridays then clearly its a flexible working request that HR is likely to look favourably upon since otherwise there's potentially a redundancy situation anyway.

And yes she will have overtaken a significant amount of leave and will have to repay this if she changes her working pattern.

Maybe others have had holiday requests turned down during the last 30 weeks I order to accommodate her, they will now need to share it out fairly and she'll need to pull her weight by being in the office.

I don't think either party is really that unreasonable.

Your DSis was fair enough to use her leave however she saw fit, as agreed with her manager. She was fair enough to request PT. And also fair enough to appeal any decision that she feels is unfair. Though, not really reasonable to actually complain, rather than appeal.

HR is fair enough to turn down her request for PT, if it doesn't suit the business. I don't think we can judge whether their reasons stand up.

In my work, PT requests are decided by HR, not line managers (as they change on a regular basis). However, they have clear policy rules about what will get approved, and what won't, and people are aware of these.

Rather a gamble on your DSIS's part! She's now got 3 days' holiday left until September - and that's based on a full time job. So if she goes part time now, she's likely to owe them holiday back.

Hasn't your sister simply proved to her employers that her job is really a 3 day a week job, and they've been overpaying her for taking 5 days to do it before? In which case, they could argue she can continue with the same role, for less money, in a 3 day a week position. Or has she been not doing/delegating some bits of it?

I think your sister has been really daft.

I had loads of annual leave left and wanted to do this, my manager frowned upon as it sends the message to HR that you don't need full time cover for the post, you are putting yourself under a lot of pressure to over perform in 3 days and its puts pressure on your colleague to cover the annual leave.

your sister hasn't got a leg to stand on!

HR are entitled to consider the effect on other members of staff. If she has been snaffling a long weekend every week for months, she may have some very pissed off colleagues.

Sounds to me like the manager said yes to the temporary arrangement with her annual leave, perhaps because of his friendship with your dsis, but wasn't comfortable with her reducing her hours permanently. I wonder if she was upfront with him about her plan to request flexible working after exhausting her annual leave, or if that was sprung on him later?

Anyway, even though she has been doing the job for three days a week, it would be different doing three days and accruing annual leave on top, and we don't know what the manager thinks about whether or not the existing arrangement is working.

Certainly, in my experience, it would be very rare for HR to decline a flexible working request if the manager supported it. It would be quite difficult to defend such a decision if the responsible manager said that it would work from an operational perspective. Consequently, I agree that the manager is probably hiding behind HR in order to avoid any conflict with his friend.

its tricky. The Hr policy here is not to allow returnees to use their holiday in that way- because of a concern that it would create a precedent and would be very hard to justify turning down a formal flexible work arrangement request. That said it depends how it has been managed to date- have people been covering her on a temporary basis- is there a strain in the system?
I do think the interaction between manager and HR is odd/at fault

OP I'll be interested to know how this pans out.